According to Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA)the debate about abortion is over. It was over in 1973, she suggested on the Senate floor Tuesday, when seven black-robed Supreme Court justices invented a constitutional right to abortion-on-demand in the United States in the case of Roe v. Wade.
Boxer misleadingly suggested that the Court “balanced all the rights, the rights of the fetus with the rights of the mother.”
Why would we want to go back the the last century and open up battles that have long been fought. Those battles were fought in 1973 when Roe v. Wade was the decision of the Supreme Court.
For Mrs. Boxer to declare the abortion debate over reveals a startling degree of hubris, as does her suggestion that the rights of children were considered in Roe.
First, she is citing one of the most heavily disputed Supreme Court decisions in American history — by pro-abortion and pr0-life Americans alike.
The Roe decision is one of the most infamous examples of judicial activism. The Heritage Foundation explains:
This case is activist because the Supreme Court relies upon notions of living constitutionalism, invoking the doctrine of “substantive due process” to create a right that is nowhere to be found in the text of the Constitution. This doctrine, which was established in Dred Scott v. Sandford, is the prime example of judges reading broad constitutional terms divorced from any textual or originalist moorings, thereby making them empty vessels into which they can pour any policy preferences they desire.
Moreover, Roe has been criticized by those on both sides of the abortion debate for “its flawed historical analysis.” For example, Justice Harry Blackmun, who wrote the opinion in Roe, hearkened back in the decision to the practices of ancient societies such as the Persian Empire while ignoring state abortion regulation at the time in the U.S.
But beyond the fact that Roe is so controversial, and that protections for preborn children were weakened again in Roe’s compantion case, Doe v. Bolton, Americans have long been divided on the issue of abortion. Today, most Americans lean pro-life, favoring greater, not fewer, restrictions on abortion.
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Even Norma McCorvey, the woman behind Roe, dedicated the her life to overturning it. She said:
I think it’s safe to say that the entire abortion industry is based on a lie…. I am dedicated to spending the rest of my life undoing the law that bears my name
Since 1973, abortion in the U.S. has taken the lives of more than 55 million children. In 1973, their rights were not considered, as Boxer suggested in her speech, because their fundamental right to life was stripped away. Abortion has also taken the lives of many women and inflicted physical and emotional harm on countless other women.
The debate about abortion is not over, Mrs. Boxer. Far from it.
LifeNews Note: Reprinted with permission from the Heritage Foundation.
